Epic Charter Schools creating dual-language immersion academy

An Epic Charter Schools site is on the cusp of becoming Oklahoma City’s new dual-language immersion school, promising an academic career in English and Spanish from early childhood to high school.

Epic’s Heritage Academy is enrolling up to 300 students from pre-K though 12th grade, a rarity in a state where most language immersion schools are offered only at the elementary and middle-school level. Its first day of school is Aug. 22.

Although the program is open to children of any background, it’s specifically geared toward educating and honoring Oklahoma City’s Hispanic population, Heritage Academy director Kelly Forbes said.

“There’s a huge need and want to have this and to have a school that isn’t created because there’s anything lacking within a community,” Forbes said. “It's rather being created because we see there’s so much to be celebrated within this community in two languages.”

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The blended learning center off of south Interstate 35 opened in 2019 as a hub for Epic’s bilingual student services and cultural activities, like folkloric dance and Mariachi music.

But, the pilot project needed leadership that could create a more defined program structure and find the right curricula for bilingual students, said Epic Superintendent Bart Banfield.

“We felt like if we could get the right leader in place then everything else would trickle down,” Banfield said.

Enter Forbes, a salsa dancer turned educator and principal.

A Tulsa native, Forbes first ignited his enthusiasm for Spanish in grade school, a passion that carried him to a Spanish major at Oklahoma City University and multiple semesters abroad.

After working as a cruise-ship salsa performer after college, Forbes pursued a career in education. He’s since taught Spanish in Thailand and worked in Oklahoma City and Tulsa schools, including two years as principal of Zarrow International School, one of Tulsa Public Schools’ two language-immersion elementary schools.

Now, Forbes is crafting the kind of school he wishes he could have attended, one with teachers from seven Spanish-speaking countries and where students spend half the day or more practicing the language.

“If I could have gone to a school like this, I would have,” he said.

Elementary students in the program will attend full school days Monday through Friday at Heritage Academy, unlike their Epic peers who typically visit Blended Learning Centers a few days a week or spend most of their time in virtual learning.

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The ideal entry point in the program is pre-K, particularly for non-Spanish-speaking students, Forbes said. Children in pre-K and kindergarten will spend 90% of the school day learning in Spanish and 10% in English.

The school gradually adds more hours of English instruction with each passing year until fourth grade. That’s when classes level out to 50% instruction in English and 50% in Spanish, and it stays that way through the end of high school.

To simplify the 50-50 split, Heritage Academy will teach all math and science classes in Spanish through 12th grade, Forbes said. English language arts and history classes will be taught in English.

The program will be one of the few language immersion schools in the Oklahoma City area. Western Gateway Elementary offers Spanish immersion in the Wheeler District, and Le Monde International School in Norman does so in Spanish and French.

Heritage Academy's goal is not only for students to read, write and speak in two languages, Forbes said, but to learn new academic content in both.

In other words, Spanish is not relegated to Spanish class.

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Forbes said this could be particularly beneficial for native Spanish speakers learning English as a second language. They would continue to learn school subjects in their native tongue while acquiring English.

And for Hispanic students born and raised in the U.S., their Spanish-language heritage is preserved, said Robert Ruiz, a school choice advocate who was integral to establishing the pilot project and organizing parent input in the program.

“We had many families whose children primarily speak English that wanted their children to regain their heritage language,” Ruiz said. “That's where the idea of Heritage Academy came from. It was to maintain that heritage language.”

Reporter Nuria Martinez-Keel covers K-12 and higher education throughout the state of Oklahoma. Have a story idea for Nuria? She can be reached at nmartinez-keel@oklahoman.com or on Twitter at @NuriaMKeel. Support Nuria’s work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today at subscribe.oklahoman.com.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Epic Charter Schools creating dual-language immersion academy in OKC